Friday, April 28, 2017

** BOOK FEATURE ** I Would, But My Damn Mind Won't Let Me by Jacqui Letran



Title: I WOULD, BUT MY DAMN MIND WON’T LET ME!
Author: Jacqui Letran
Publisher: A Healed Mind
Pages: 158
Genre: Youth/Nonfiction

Literary Classics' 2016 Lumen Award for Best Young-Adult Non-Fiction book of the year, "I would, but my DAMN MIND won't Let Me! is recommended for home, school and public libraries and for use in clinical settings."


Do you believe that life is unfair or that change is impossible? Are you unhappy and frustrated with your life? If you answered yes, you’re not alone! Teen Confidence Expert, Jacqui Letran, is here to show you a quick and easy path to a happier, healthier life. You can learn to create permanent changes for the better!
Your past can cause you to believe that making positive improvements requires a miracle. In Letran’s award-winning book, I would, but my DAMN MIND won’t let me!, you will learn the simple steps to overcome your obstacles and struggles. Once you understand how your mind works, you will have the knowledge and power to take control of your thoughts and feelings. The power to challenge your old negative patterns and create the exact life you want is in your hands.
In this book, you will discover:
·             How to challenge old negative beliefs and create positive new patterns
·             How to stay calm and in control of even the most difficult situations
·             How to keep unhealthy thoughts at bay and replace them with positive ones
·             How to use the power of your mind to create the success you deserve
·             How to create positive life experiences and much, much more!
·              
I would, but my DAMN MIND won’t let me! is a groundbreaking guide to help you take control of your life. If you like real-life advice that works fast and doesn’t talk down to you, then you will love Jacqui Letran’s game-changing book for teens and young adults. This book is recommended for teens, parents of teens, professionals working with teens, and anyone who is interested in learning how to take control of their mind.
Get the award-winning book today to give yourself an unfair advantage in life!

I Would, But My Damn Mind Won’t Let Me!
is available for purchase at

Book Excerpt:
Who’s The Boss?
Given the information presented so far, who do you
think is the boss—your conscious mind or your unconscious
mind? If you chose your conscious mind, you are
correct! Your conscious mind is always the boss. It’s the
part of your mind that is capable of processing and analyzing
data. It’s the part of your mind that has free will
to make decisions and is capable of accepting and rejecting
information. It’s the part of your mind that filters information
in order to come up with the Master Plan.

Your Reality Exists Only
In Your Mind

Do you remember when I said your conscious mind is
only capable of processing less than one percent, and
your unconscious mind is capable of processing one
hundred percent of the data that you encounter? What
does that really mean?

To put things into perspective, your unconscious
mind receives millions of bits of data every single second.
Millions of bits of data every single second! Stop
and take that in for a moment. Every single second of
your life, your unconscious mind is bombarded with millions
of bits of data, which is equivalent to all of the
words in seven volumes of average-sized books. That’s
a lot of information to process every single second.
Now imagine what it would be like for you if you
were to become aware of millions of bits of data every
single second of your life. How would you feel if you
were forced to process seven volumes of books every
single second? Your conscious mind is just not capable
of processing that much data. You would go into severe
sensory overload and would most likely explode or shut
down. Lucky for you, all of that is happening in the
background of your unconscious mind and is not within
your awareness.

Of the millions of bits of data, the conscious part of
your mind is only able to process 126 bits of data per
second. To demonstrate what this looks like, let’s look
back at the example of the millions of bits of data as being
equivalent to all the words within seven volumes of
books. Of the seven books that your unconscious mind
is processing, your conscious mind is only capable of
seeing one word. One word! That one word, whichever
one word that might be, is the only one that makes it into
your awareness and that is what becomes your reality.
I want you to stop and think about what that really
means. Imagine reading seven books and understanding
only one word, thus believing that one word is, in fact,
the only subject of those books. Is there something you
might be missing? The important takeaway here is to realize
that each of us is most likely focusing on a different
word that becomes our respective realities.
Your reality only exists in your mind and nowhere
else. You might have a similar experience to that
of another person, but when you break it down into
tiny details, you will find significant variations.
Go ahead and try this exercise out for fun. Close your
eyes and turn to a random page in this book and point to
a word. Now open your eyes and look at that word. Does
this one word represent everything this book is about? I
can guarantee the answer is no. This book is so much
more than the one word you’ve randomly picked, but
that demonstrates well how your conscious reality might
be misrepresented by the powerful filtering system of
your mind.

In the Spotlight: The Feet Say Run by Daniel A. Blum


Title: THE FEET SAY RUN
Author: Daniel A. Blum
Publisher: Gabriel’s Horn Press
Pages: 349
Genre: Literary Fiction
At the age of eighty-five, Hans Jaeger finds himself a castaway among a group of survivors on a deserted island.  What is my particular crime?  he asks.   Why have I been chosen  for this fate?  And so he begins his extraordinary chronicle. 

It would be an understatement to say he has lived a full life.  He has grown up in Nazi Germany and falls in love with Jewish girl.  He fights for the Germans on two continents, watches the Reich collapse spectacularly into occupation and starvation, and marries his former governess.  After the war he goes on wildflower expeditions in the Alps, finds solace among prostitutes while his wife lay in a coma, and marries a Brazilian chambermaid in order to receive a kidney from her. 

By turns sardonic and tragic and surreal, Hans’s story is the story of all of the insanity, irony and horror of the modern world itself.  

FOR MORE INFORMATION:

Amazon | Barnes & Noble

 


Book Excerpt:

It was early November.  November 5, to be exact.  1938.   I was with Hilda when we heard the news over the radio.  A German diplomat had been shot.  By a Jew.  We’d never heard of this diplomat.  Who had?  But suddenly it was all over the news.  This abominable act!  Committed not just by a Jew.  But, rather, by the Jews.  This high crime!  For a few days the diplomat clung to life.    But the fury of the official broadcasts was astonishing.  The demands for revenge.  And then, on the day I had marked for my next visit with Sylvia, this obscure diplomat, now elevated to the level of a great personage, died of his wounds—martyred himself for the cause of all of us violated Germans.
Hilda and I just looked at one another.
“I think you need to get her out now,” Hilda said.  And then, “If you’re going to do it.”
I nodded.
The wireless was broadcasting stories of rioting breaking out all over Germany.  Anti-Jewish rage.  Synagogues torched.  Storefronts smashed.  From inside Hilda’s apartment though, we heard nothing.  It was like any other night.  Would it really spread to our quiet little town?
I left for Sylvia’s before midnight.  The crooked alleys in Hilda’s neighborhood were all calm.  Maybe none of it was true.  There were people out here and there, maybe more than usual —groups of threes and fours, mostly drawn out by the news, wondering what they would see.  But it was a chilly night, and that seemed to keep people moving.
As I walked toward the river I could hear more voices.  And then there was something.  A lamp store.  Brodsky’s Lamps and Lampshades.  Smashed to ruins.  Shards of glass everywhere.  Just as the radio had described it.  Why had it happened here though?  What was this strange, magical connection between the radio and this pile of debris?   Is that what it means to be a social species, that we will simply do what we believe others are doing?  We hear words on the radio, people are destroying Jewish businesses, and like pre-programmed automatons, we interpret this message as an instruction?
I moved on, walked along old streets, under medieval arches, and out to the less ancient, less huddled part of town.  Across all of it was a sort of crystalline quiet.  A milkman’s wagon passed —the horse clopping and snorting.  Along the next block I scared up a yard of chickens, startled myself with the sudden clucking and scattering.  Peaceful Edelburg.  My storybook town.
 I was most of the way to Sylvia’s when I approached something again.  A commotion.  I drew closer.   A crowd of figures, milling around a square, Vanderplatz.  Watching something.  Watching what?  There were voices.  Shouts.  I approached.   Peeked through a pair of shoulders.   A man was being pushed by several men.  They were shouting at him.  Trying to get him to push back.  He was older, had a frightened face, kept trying to back away, but there was always someone behind him, giving him another shove.  His hair was disheveled.  Beside them, on the ground, was a hat that had evidently been knocked off his head.  What did they want from him? 
A woman, who seemed to be his wife, was restrained by two other men.  One had her arms.  The other had a hand in her hair.  She was crying, protesting.  She wore a heavy coat that bunched in the neck as they pried her arms back.  When she spoke, the hand in her hair drove her down lower, until at last she was on her knees, and drool was dripping from her mouth.  Now the man protested the woman’s treatment, begged on her behalf, and this resulted in a fist hitting his stomach.  He bent over, breathless, as other blows started to land on him.
What an unreal quality it had though.  This one little act.  This one droplet of cruelty amid the sea that seemed to be sweeping the country.  You could even sense a kind of self-consciousness among the perpetrators.  Acting out this bit of violence, getting themselves comfortable with it, acclimated to it, this act that they had heard was happening everywhere, trying this new thing out, yet having trouble identifying this old couple, these actual people, with the criminal Juden of the broadcasts.
And then, after the first blow, how much easier it seemed, the next punches coming so much more naturally, the hatred starting to feed on itself, the inner pleasure at inflicting pain.  Yes!  This was going to be a beautiful thing, this new violence!  It was just a question of adjusting to it.  That the victims were old and helpless, that there was nothing that they had actually done to deserve it that anyone could name—wasn’t that really part of the joy?  Wasn’t that liberating in some way?  Because if you could beat these people, punch their elderly faces and kick their sides, with all these others watching, doing nothing to stop it, didn’t that give you a kind of power, not merely over your victims, but over everybody, everything?  Could you not take it even farther, see how far it could go?
There were maybe only six or seven young men actually involved in tormenting this couple, and maybe sixty or seventy watching silently.  Many no doubt shocked, horrified, wishing it would stop.  But silent as an audience watching a performance in a theatre.  Silent as a group of schoolchildren watching a bully pick on someone smaller and weaker.  Each thinking maybe now someone should stop this.  It has gone on long enough.  Someone should intercede.  But who?  How?  Others just incorporating it.  Accepting it.  Who knew.
And then there was that awkward moment.  That end without an end—the victims just lying there bloodied.  The beating done.  Only there was no curtain to lower upon the scene.  And that lack of a proper ending seemed to reveal, even to the perpetrators, the pointlessness of what they had done.  Did they just walk away?  Bow to their audience?  What?  At last it occurred to one of them to spit on the couple.  And then the others recognized the virtue of this, and added their spit.  And their beads of spit landed like hateful, little exclamations points on their victims.  And thus having found a suitable denouement, they turned away, headed off, whooping, breaking into some Nazi song—as though it were the final number in a musical.
Kristallnacht had come to Edelburg. 

For a while the crowd stayed where it was, looked on at those two heaps of suffering, as though still expecting something more to happen.  Wondering if it is over.  Wondering if they should offer assistance, call the police, deposit their own spit.  In the end though, they did none of these.  Instead they just watched for a while more and wandered off, left to sort out their own thoughts.
I was one of the last to leave.  I watched them stagger up.  Alive.  Moaning.  I briefly caught the man’s eye.  At least someone get him his hat, I thought.  But I didn’t.  I left.  Just as the others had.
Just a few more blocks to Sylvia’s, and now I felt even more urgently the need to reach her.  I was aware of forms passing this way and that.  More than would normally have been out at that hour.  I heard muffled voices.  But it was difficult to see very much.  The night was moonless.  Who were they?  It was hard to make out.
I waited across the street for a while, until it seemed there was nobody around.  Then I slipped around the back of Sylvia’s house and tossed a pebble at the window.   A moment later I was inside.  I was in her arms.  That same shocking nakedness through her nightgown.  Pressed against her.  We tiptoed up to her room, just as we had on my last visit.  I undressed.  Slipped into her bed.   At first I was still seeing that scene at Vanderplatz that I had witnessed.  That vignette.  And then in another instant it was gone.  As though a great wave came over consciousness itself, obliterating everything.  Because how could this beautiful sensation and that horrid memory coexist?  Or maybe I just willed it away.  I just wanted the pureness of the moment.  No past and no future.   No words.  Just the sensation, the great ocean-wave of desire, flooding everything.  So that when the bed creaked it was as though reality itself had given us a little nudge.  No, you cannot forget me.  I am right outside.  I am waiting for you.




About the Author

Daniel A. Blum grew up in New York, attended Brandeis University and currently lives outside of Boston with his family. His first novel Lisa33 was published by Viking in 2003. He has been featured in Poets and Writers magazine, Publisher’s Weekly and most recently, interviewed in Psychology Today.

Daniel writes a humor blog, The Rotting Post, that has developed a loyal following.

His latest release is the literary novel, The Feet Say Run.

WEBSITE & SOCIAL LINKS:

WEBSITE | TWITTER | FACEBOOK


In the Spotlight: Gil by Darin Gibby



Title: GIL
Author: Darin Gibby
Publisher: Keohler Books
Pages: 301
Genre: Contemporary Fiction/Baseball

Some gifts come with a price.

Twenty years before, high school coach Gil Gilbert gave up his dream to play professional baseball so he could marry his pregnant girlfriend, Keri. When he miraculously discovers that he can pitch with deadly accuracy and speed, he must choose between his successful career and comfortable family life or his chance to play with the Colorado Rockies during a player’s strike. Gil stuns the pitching staff with 100 mph fastballs and is offered a contract.

After joining the Rockies, the world soon learns that Gil is a supernatural phenomenon and the Rockies keep winning. But Gil soon faces stiff opposition, including a frivolous lawsuit, a father who feels his son’s calling to pitch is to save souls, and threats from the striking players. As the season progresses, Gil discovers that his unexpected gift is the result of a rare disease, and continuing to pitch may hasten his own death.  While Keri supports his decision to keep playing, she is fearful about her husband’s bizarre health condition.

Gil must decide what price he is willing to pay to live his dream.

FOR MORE INFORMATION:

Amazon | Barnes & Noble


Book Excerpt:

GIL HURLED THE baseball as hard as he could at the
backstop. He needed to blow off steam and calm himself before
he did something stupid, or regrettable. He picked up another ball
from the fluorescent-orange five-gallon bucket, and concentrated
on his form.
He was consumed with frustration, and was venting with the
baseball instead of with his fists or mouth. He tried concentrating
on his form instead of his woes. Gil could control his pitches,
but not his destiny. He was good, but not good enough. At age
forty-four, Gil knew he was well past his prime and was trying
to accept the inevitability of unfulfilled dreams.
He reached again into the bucket beside him on the mound
and grabbed another ball. Focusing his form, he hurled another,
and then another. Arm back; elbow bent, he told himself. He
threw once again, then he looked up, and saw his buddy and
assistant coach, Peck, making his way over to him from a series
of disjointed brown brick buildings, the campus of the Prairie
Ridge High School Coyotes.
“First strike I’ve seen you throw all night. What gives, Gil?”
Gil kept his foot lodged against the rubber on the pitcher’s
mound then stooped down and plucked up another baseball.
2 GIL
With a quick windup, another of his pitches cut the thin Colorado
air and hammered the fence.
“Okay,” Peck interrupted, stepping between the mound and
home plate. “That’s enough, Gil. We need to talk before you ruin
a whole bucket of balls—and your arm. With these budget cuts
we’ll be lucky if we get enough for the season.” He turned and
made his way to the backstop, tugging on two balls lodged in the
wire lattice. Peck yanked one out and ran his fingers across the
torn leather.
“Holy crap,” he muttered to himself, shaking his head.
Gil flippantly tossed the ball back into the orange bucket.
“What’s got you so pissed off?” Peck asked.
Gil slid the back of his worn leather glove across his brow.
“I’ve got my reasons.”
“Like?”
“All my life I’ve worked so hard, tried to do the right thing,
and look what it’s gotten me.”
Peck lifted up his ball cap and smoothed back his brown
wavy hair, letting his burly hand glide over his six-inch mullet.
“Are you kidding me? You’ve got the hottest wife this side
of the Mississippi, two of the most well-mannered kids I’ve ever
met, and you’re one of the most highly respected high school
coaches in the state. And you’re still playing ball—and coaching
it. Most guys your age gave it up long ago. What’s with the selfpity?”
“My age, exactly,’’ Gil huffed. “What I’ve really got is some
loser job that is going nowhere fast.”
“Shoot, Gil. I’m your assistant. What does that make me? A
double loser?’’
Peck made his way to the mound, his tattooed arms folded,
like a coach ready to talk some sense into his rattled starter, or
else make a decision to yank him before the other team could do
any more damage.
“How so?”
“We don’t need to go into this, not now.”
Peck continued rolling the ball in his hands, digging his
fingernail into the sliced leather. “Oh, I think we do. You know,
with the strike, all the major league teams are looking for
replacement players. You could try out for the Rockies.”
DARIN GIBBY 3
Gil grunted. “That’s not going to last. The owners will cave
before the season starts and all those replacement players will
be back on the streets. Besides, I gave up that dream—and I’m
too old. All I’ve been doing is messing around in the rec leagues
for years. I’d get creamed, even by replacement players.”
“Not from what I’ve seen. You can still throw in the eighties,
and you have a big breaking ball. I’ve seen it. No way, I bet you
were just firing at least eighty-five,” said Peck, looking at one of
the scarred balls he plucked from the fence. “That’s better than
most minor leaguers.”
“You never told me why you didn’t try to play professionally,”
Peck continued. “You must have had one rocket of an arm when
you were younger.”
“Unlike you, I didn’t stand a chance,” Gil snapped back.
“That’s not what I heard. And not with what I just watched
you throw. What gives?”
“It’s really complicated.”
“Try me.”
Gil hung his head and breathed out deeply.
“Well, when I was playing for ASU, a lot of scouts were
looking at me. I had to make a decision.”
“Like?”
“Being a responsible adult and finishing my degree, or being
flighty and chasing some harebrained idea that I was good
enough to play professional baseball.”
“I take it you were offered a contract?”
Gil nodded.
“You never told me that. So why didn’t you sign?”
“Some things came up, and getting a degree seemed like a
better choice than wasting my life away in the minors.”
“Easy there. Remember who you’re talking to.”
“You had a real chance, Peck—if you hadn’t had those elbow
problems. Not so with me. Do you know how many twenty-yearolds
can throw a ninety-mile-an-hour fastball?”
Peck shrugged.
“A whole bunch.” Gil adjusted his cap. “It’s water under the
bridge. My life is in the history books. I made my bed and all
that stuff. I’ve lived a very mediocre life. Four years of misery
to get a physics degree. I was too much of a loser to even try to
4 GIL
get a masters degree. I took a job as a lousy high school teacher
making fifty thousand a year, coaching on the side. What kind of
loser career is that?”
“Again, Gil, consider your audience. At least you are the
head coach. Look at me. I’d kill for your job.”
Gil spit and covered up the spittle with a kick of his toe. “You
know I didn’t mean that.”
“But seriously. How can you say it is a loser job? With all
the talk of your science fair this year—and another season in the
playoffs—you could easily get teacher of the year. How many
people can brag about that? And the kids here love you to death.
You are the coolest teacher ever. How many high school students
beg to have their science teacher play at their prom? You can
sing Sunday Bloody Sunday better than Bono.”
“When I get to play him! The only gigs I get anymore are
overplayed country songs about some guy finding religion. Have
I ever written one of my own?”
Peck shrugged. “I’ll bet you have.”
“Well maybe, but you’ll never hear it on the radio. Just good
ol’ Gil. Friend to everyone, foe to no one. That’s all I am.”
“Well tell me this, if teaching is such a loser job as you say,
then why did you choose it?”
Gil shook his head. “I don’t want to go there.”
Peck hopped up beside his friend and shoved him back,
enough to dislodge Gil’s foot from the rubber. “With the energy
you were putting into that ball, I think we need to go there. Come
clean with me. How long have we been together?”
Gil’s jaw muscles clenched, and he slapped his glove against
his thigh then looked up into the fading sky. “Alright, I’ll tell
you, if you really want to know. I did the honorable thing and
married her, then dumped any dream of playing pro ball. I took
a teaching job to pay for the baby. Would you believe that I
met her at a frat party? You know when you go to those dinner
parties and everyone has to tell how they met? I couldn’t do it.
I made up some story about how I picked her out of the crowd
when we were playing UCLA.”
“Whoa, wait a minute. Way too much information. I didn’t
mean to pry like that.”
“She was pregnant. My plans for baseball were over. And
DARIN GIBBY 5
don’t you ever mention it to anyone—my kids don’t know.”
Peck reached out and put a hand on Gil’s broad shoulder.
“How was that a bad thing? Look at what it got you.”
“Yeah, a beautiful family that I can’t even support. Not
now—not now that I am going to lose everything.”
“Gil, what exactly are you talking about?”
“The little turd is suing me, that’s what.”
“Are you drinking, man?”
“Do I ever drink? I am the clean-cut all-American parent.
Except that now I am getting hauled into court.”
“For what? Wait, for when Zach was screwing around after
practice and thunked Shaila in the head?”
“Yes, they’re suing the school and me personally. Two
million bucks. Claiming the ball cracked her skull and caused
brain damage.”
“If you ask me, the ditz already had brain damage.”
“Yeah, well tell that to a jury. They are going to wipe me out.”
“They can ask for anything, you know that. Besides that, the
school district is required to defend you.”
“That’s what I thought, but it’s not that clear. What if they
don’t? I can’t afford a lawyer. You know how much I make. What
am I going to do?”
Peck also spit and shook his head. “I see now.” Then he went
and fished a catcher’s mitt from the equipment bag. “Okay, at
least throw the rest at me so we don’t destroy any more balls. And
don’t worry, they won’t fire you. Can you imagine the protests?
You’ve had a winning season for fifteen straight years.”
Gil went into a full windup and whipped the ball at his catcher,
each pitch slamming into the glove with a loud smack. Peck bolted
up and tossed down the mitt, shaking his stinging hand.
“Holy crap! What is going on here? You taking some kind of
performance cocktail? Your gut is gone, your chest looks like a
bulldog’s, and you are solid as a rock.”
A hint of a smile crept onto Gil’s weathered face. “Drugs?
Never did them—not being the son of a preacher.”
“Then what? You don’t just all of the sudden hurl like that.”
“Mid-life crisis is all. Lots of stress builds the physique… and
I’ve been working out some.”
“No, man. What kind of drugs are you on? I’ve caught for a
6 GIL
lot of pitchers, but nothing like this. You gotta be throwing in the
nineties, pushing a hundred. I’ve got to get a speed gun on you,
Gil. What is the record these days?”
“The fastest pitch? Some say Bob Feller threw a one-hundredand-
seven-mile-an-hour fastball, but who knows? Most of those
guys were full of themselves. That was before radar, so it is all
speculation.”
“You are the science guy. You should know.”
“Since modern speed guns came around, there has been a few
clocked at one hundred and four, and in 2010 Aroldis Chapmin
was officially measured at one hundred and five. But it’s hard to
say. Feller thought Satchel Paige was the fastest pitcher alive.
So, could he throw faster than one hundred and seven?”
“What were you in college?”
“Fastest was ninety-one.”
“Then that confirms it—you are all screwed up my friend.
A forty-four-year-old man can’t throw like that, not without a
whole lotta dope.”
“No drugs, man. You’re just getting old. Bad eyesight and
soft hands. Still getting those manicures?”
“Hey, the last time was with you. Come on Gil. Let’s be
honest here. This is crazy stuff. Those balls I pulled out of the
fence—the leather was completely torn through. Let’s try one
more, just as a sanity check. Let me have it. Get really pissed off.
Imagine you are throwing at that lawyer’s face.”
Peck backpedaled to the plate and pounded his fist into his
glove. “Give me all you’ve got.”
This time the ball whizzed into Peck’s glove with the same
familiar smack. Peck removed his hand from the glove. The
palm was red.
“I think that confirms it,” he said, shaking his head.
“Tomorrow I am going to make a few calls.”


About the Author

In addition to a thriving career as a novelist, author Darin Gibby is also one of the country’s premiere patent attorneys and a partner at the prestigious firm of Kilpatrick Townsend (www.kilpatricktownsend.com). With over twenty years of experience in obtaining patents on hundreds of inventions from the latest drug delivery systems to life-saving cardiac equipment, he has built IP portfolios for numerous Fortune 500 companies. In addition to securing patents, Gibby helps clients enforce and license their patents around the world, and he has monetized patents on a range of products.

Darin’s first book, Why Has America Stopped Inventing?, explored the critical issue of America’s broken patent system.  His second book, The Vintage Club, tells the story of a group of the world’s wealthiest men who are chasing a legend about a wine that can make you live forever. His third book, Gil, is about a high school coach who discovers that he can pitch with deadly speed and is given an offer to play with the Rockies during a player’s strike. Gil soon discovers, however, that his unexpected gift is the result of a rare disease, and continuing to pitch may hasten his own death.
With a Bachelor of Science degree in mechanical engineering and a Master of Business Administration degree, he is highly regarded in Denver’s legal and business community as a patent strategist, business manager, and community leader. He is also a sought-after speaker on IP issues at businesses, colleges and technology forums, where he demonstrates the value of patents using simple lessons from working on products such as Crocs shoes, Izzo golf straps and Trek bicycles.
An avid traveler and accomplished triathlete, Darin also enjoys back country fly-fishing trips and skiing in the Rocky Mountains. He lives in Denver with his wife, Robin, and their four children.

WEBSITE & SOCIAL LINKS:





Tuesday, April 18, 2017

In the Spotlight: The Spirit of Love by the spirit of love known as glen




Title: THE SPIRIT OF LOVE
Author:
the spirit of love, known as glen
Publisher: Aurora House
Pages: 196
Genre: Spirituality/Poetry

The Spirit of Love is a collection of short writings, poems and phrases written by a man who took himself into some of the darkest and most destructive depths that one can go with drug and alcohol addictions back in his early twenties.

The collection of writings contained within The Spirit of Love are the result of one man’s healing journey within himself and the deep questioning that has arisen from within it.

With the love, support and guidance of his dear friend Edwina, in helping to bring these writings from the handwritten scribbles on paper to how they are presented today, The Spirit of Love is a reminder that no matter how dark, desperate, alone, helpless or trapped one believes they may be, the sheer beauty of the perfection of life in its totality is silently and patiently living within us all, and its love is so powerful that it can heal anything that has come to pass.

FOR MORE INFORMATION:

Amazon | Barnes & Noble


Book Excerpt:


6.
Take me now so that I need never feel again
Screaming inside I keep everything in
Release me now so I may tear this skin from off my shell
For free can I not be from this living hell?

7.
Why are you afraid?
Swept along without giving a moment to stop
Why are you going to the next place you want to be?
What’s wrong with where you are now?
Is the next place going to be any different or better?
Funny how unwilling you have become to look
Can it be that bad inside?
Afraid to feel life no more
Oh, how the voice is clever
Feeding the prey so as not to be hunted.

9.
Staring at you the battle begins
Nightmare’s voice always wins
Fighting so strongly against my will
Oh, the insanity contained in a pill
Within gulp of water’s cup
Battle lost I’ve given up
Slowly the chemicals suffocate my brain
The next few hours surely insane.

10.
How can you label I and in turn yourself?
For labels change as frequently as the weather
I am changeless – eternal
Let your sight not fool you into a world of form
Enjoy thy magic and mystery
Play with it joyfully and compassionately
But see yourself not of it
Are you your job?
Is that the limit of your destiny?
Why do you choose to do what you do?
Is it really you doing it?
Look what the eternal search has brought
A searching with no end to wanting
That which you truly not need.

11.
Stop it, stop it, I hear you scream, the voice constant in its demands of you
But what can be done if broken you have become?
Bound to a meaningless death whilst your feet still walk
Bow to grace as freedom is you just in being
See the butterfly kiss the wind as a graceful dance
What have you become outside yourself?
Smash all mirrors as they do not allow you to see what lies beneath
Seven colours formed of white
Form holds the illusion together not wanting it to be seen
All that allows it to be is what’s in-between
No sense I make, so that your mind can move beyond the hours of 9 till 5
I lie timeless for you.

20.
Is mankind reflecting upon itself?
From and within the boundless nothingness that I Am
Nothing more or less than degrees of variation
Like a leaf throughout the seasons of its cycle
Come within so that I am released from form
And journey from stillness back to stillness
As infinite space and eternal grace dance together in the hands of thy children
Mention not a word of I, nor a thought, nor emotion, invisible I remain
See that star in your eye?
It is your world beneath your world
A diamond in the form of a stone
Belong to silence, cometh to existence through seed of breath, even and pure.

24.
Cannot you feel the spirit within her? Why? Why? Why?
You poison her veins with fluorescent venom
Yet still she gives you soil to grow your food
You shatter her body with each bomb that tears at her skin
Yet still she gives you air to breathe
Your chemical mind soaks away her pure clear blood
Yet still she gives you water to quench greed’s thirst
Great Mother Earth, you inspire me to a love that holds no enemy
Take not a moment more to cleanse your soul from our mistrust
Seeing you create your balance now
A new earth awaits your presence
And yet still you wish to give us abundance’s dance
Your wisdom singing peacefully within thy true self
A self of love, a selfless love
My weeping heart bleeds its last drop into your soil
Take it and send me to my grave with your earthy kiss
For you have earned your rest from the hand of man.

37.
Is thy being too simple for belief?
A simple being of love sets everything free

40.
For whilst thoughts, emotions, content, story and experience is a part of the journey, it is a mere ripple on the surface of the vast depthless ocean of thy being, of which I know nothing.




About the Author

At the peak of his destructive cycle glen was so consumed by addictions, that on any given day saw the abusive consumption of cocaine, MDMA powder, special K, ecstasy, crystal meth, marijuana, prescription drugs (anti-depressants, sleeping pills) and alcohol.

A time that saw him attempting and failing to out race police cars through the streets of a Melbourne suburb one night, to experiencing a near death experience while bleeding out from a glass injury when holidaying overseas, a time of daily self-harming with the prospect of suicide never being far out of reach.

However, through the unconditional love of his parents, glen found himself backpacking though South America where a collection of events and direct experiences with the local people and Mother Earth herself, triggered the beginning stages of what would later become known to him as the shattering and dissolving of the false identity of the illusionary mind-made-self and its “poor me” story.

An inner-journey that awakens the spirit of love, known as glen, to not being a personal identity as such but rather a way of being, a way of simplicity, a way of the heart, a way that embraces and dances with the perfection of the present moment like no other.

You can visit the author’s website at www.spiritoflove.com.au or his Facebook page at www.facebook.com/thespiritoflovebook.


❤Inside the Pages: ST. JAMES INFIRMARY by Steven Meloan #bookspotlight #insidethepages

  Title: St. James Infirmary Title: St. James Infirmary   Author: Steven Meloan Publisher: Roadside Press Pages: 80 Genre:...